Deathwish
by Kaji Fireson
Summary: This story contains only two characters: an original character of mine and Sapphire of The Rogue's Gallery fame. TRG is Alan Solivan's work, and it is good. Go read it after you read Deathwish. Rating for scarce language.


A/N-Disclaimer: The demoness they call Sapphire-

WHO'S THEY?

Damnit...this joke's been done already! Anyway, Sapphire is NOT my creation (though I wish she was: she is hella-cool, in my humble opinion): all credit for that must be given to Alan Solivan a.k.a. Mr. O.M.A. The other character (whose name you never learn) IS mine, however, and if you wish to use him yourself...well, then you must be crazy! If you wanna' borrow someone else's characters, borrow some Rogues (but don't forget to credit the O.M.A.: he is very particular about this)! They are much more creative...erm, creations, and will probably serve your purposes much better. However, if you're dead-set on borrowing my character, please ask permission first. Anyway, enough of my rambling: on with the show!

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Deathwish

The wind rustled through the nearby trees ominously as the two figures stared each other down across the flat plain.

One was a well-built young man in his early twenties who wielded a dangerous looking red staff. He was clothed in a large, red cloak that masked most of his figure other than the fact that he was well-built and the fact that his eyes were the same piercing, fiery red that his staff and cloak were.

The other was a female of strange attire. She was not cloaked, and so her figure was clearly visible for her opponent to see. Her hair was as black as it comes and tied into a high ponytail in the back of her head with two large bangs arching off of her forehead in a way as to prevent it from hindering her sight. On her forehead was a strange emblem that appears to be two sideways carats facing opposite directions with a raised bullet enclosed within the diamond that is formed by them. This emblem also appears on her chest as slices that have been artistically removed from the upper half of her black body suit. The bottom half also sports slits all down the side of both legs, but they are simple lateral slits: nothing fancy. Around her waist is a simple belt with a gold clasp on the front, and coming from this and flowing dramatically behind her is a red cape that somehow adds to her menacing appearance. Lastly, her left arm is heavily bandaged for some unknown reason.

"You may be overpowered in your own realm, demoness," the cloaked man declared as he took a fighting stance, "but you are in my realm now. Let's see how you fare here."

"Foolish mortal. You, like so many before you, are about to face my wrath!" the demoness responded to the first's taunt.

"En garde!" the first figure cried, and the two rushed forward and met in the middle of the new battlefield, where they struggled in an initial standstill. The cloaked figure was using his staff to get better leverage, but the demoness grabbed it and pushed back against him. After a few moments of this, the cloaked figure wrenched his staff away from the demoness and each combatant jumped back to about where they started.

_Hm...it would seem that a different strategy would be a good idea... _was the thought that occurred to both warriors.

Each fighter charged again, but, at the last moment, each stopped on a dime and jumped straight up. Each looked down to commence their aerial assault, but there was no one to be seen. Looking back up, each fighter was greeted by the sight of the other. Each threw a mid-air punch, causing their fists to meet in the middle and consequently sending them sailing back to square one again.

G_rr..._ Quickly formulating new strategies, each charged towards the middle of the field once more. The demoness executed a graceful somersault over the cloaked man and landed behind where he had been, but the cloaked figure had teleported away, reappearing in a backwards skid a good distance away from the midpoint, but in a different line of sight where tree-branches hovered over him where he stood after stopping. Quickly, the two charged at each other again (the demoness was forced to change directions quickly, as she had been poised to land behind the cloaked man and charge him from behind before he had teleported away), each intending to claim the first strike. The cloaked man and the demoness each threw punches again, but this time, each fist connected with the opposing face, causing each fighter to be thrown backwards: the demoness stayed on her feet and just skidded back while the cloaked man was thrown into the air, but he executed a backflip that landed him on his feet (and one hand) as he skidded to a stop in the opposite direction.

As she stopped, the demoness raised a hand to her face and touched the spot where she was struck as she affected an expression of disbelief. "Wow," she said aloud. "I didn't expect that to actually hurt..."

_Yeah, no kidding,_ the cloaked man thought as he shook the offending fist, intending to disspell the uncomfortable feeling that striking the demoness had created.

"You're better than I thought, kid," the demoness mused aloud as she stretched a bit.

"You're not that bad yourself," the cloaked man replied, grinning. But, just as quickly as he had grinned, his expression changed to one of deadly seriousness. "But I think playtime is just about over...wouldn't you say?" Without waiting for a reply, the cloaked figure bent down and put his staff down slowly, stood back up, and dramatically threw off his cloak. Underneath, he wore a short-sleeved, bright red T-shirt to match his cloak. It was obvious that, underneath that, there was a shirt of chainmail to protect against whatever may try to harm him. He also wore black pants that tucked into sturdy, blood-red boots.

The two of them finished stretching as he stood up.

"You must be pretty confident if you're letting me finish warming up like this," he remarked as they did so.

She shrugged. "Gives me time to think," she replied, detached.

Be careful, demoness, he thought smugly. In taking this breather, its benefits could be unwittingly conferred upon the opponent as well...

He leaned back to stretch his back, then he returned to an upright position and cracked his knuckles to show that he was ready. Though his opponent did no such thing, it was obvious that she was born ready.

Then, without so much as another spoken word, both combatants simultaneously launched themselves at each other. The male was poised to throw a punch (and did so), but the demoness stayed on the defensive and blocked. The man threw out his right leg towards the demoness's stomach, but she blocked this as well. Similar punches and kicks from both sides of the warrior's body were launched, but each was blocked by the famed demoness.

Suddenly, the demoness retaliated with a left hook of her own! However, her opponent had not become so caught up in offense that he neglected defense. He quickly changed that right-hand punch he was preparing into a block to stop her attack. Thereafter, a flurry of kicks and punches from all sides began as the two excnaghed blows. Soon, their battle took to the air as they drifted upward into the sky. Abruptly, each tried to bypass the other's defenses by headbutting his/her opponent. This particular battle was won by the demoness as her opponent was launched backwards through the sky.

"Damn...his head is harder than I thought," she muttered under her breath as she rubbed her forehead. Soon, however, she was flying through the air after him. He quickly reset himself midair just in time to meet the demoness's attack and block all of her attacks. Then he landed a kick to her stomach, sending her sailing away. The demoness quickly caught herself and, in turn, met her opponent's onslaught. And so, for a while, the fight consisted of short bursts (some longer than others) which would end when one fighter landed a good hit on the other, sending him or her flying. The one who landed the strike would chase after the other, who would recover and meet the attack with sufficient skill to block most (if not all) of the attacker's blows. The short bursts were not always won on a 1:1 basis: there were cases where one of the combatants would win two or three in a row. However, the other would invariably recover before too much damage was done.

After a while of this, the demoness did something that would take the fight to the next (and final) level: after knocking her adversary away, she launched a small (but significant) energy blast after him instead of chasing him herself. Not expecting this, the human reset himself as normal and braced for an attack that never came. He looked up just in time to take the blast full force, an event that caused him to fall all the way back down to the ground with a great, ominous thud.

The demoness, grinning, drifted back toward the ground in a much more graceful descent. She massaged her right arm (the unsuspecting victim of a particularly well-aimed kick from her foe) once she landed, but this did not harm her spirits as she walked towards her fallen enemy, who was struggling to stand.

He chuckled a bit from his gut as he stood. "Ah...good one. I suppose I should have seen that one coming. However, just because I fell down, don't think the battle is over!" The demoness's grin vanished as her opponent performed a similar feat.

"Don't get me wrong, you fiend: just because I teleported doesn't mean I'm hiding!" The demoness, slightly irritated by the name-calling, turned around to find her opponent standing about a hundred yards away. He stood tensely with his arms at his sides, but, as the expert of long-distance combat that she is, the demoness recognized his intent. Suddenly, he grinned. "You know, I must tell you at this point that long-range combat is my fortè," he informed her.

"Really?" she replied, smirking as she feigning surprise.

"Do not mock me!" he cried. He levitated about a foot into the air and stretched each limb out as far as it would go as if he were sprawled out on the ground and fixing to make a snow angel. After a few moments, his entire body began glowing red. His aura was dim at first, but soon, it was as bright and fiery as his hair or eyes.

_Hm. Impressive. The little devil wasn't lying. This could be interesting._

Before, the human had had his head leaned back, but now he looked down at his target. "What? Not charging up or anything? I know you can release your Hellfire Flash in an instant, but will you really take the chance of letting me power up? Not that I'm complaining, of course!" he finished, smirking himself.

"That's just the thing," the demoness replied. "I know, for an undisputed, absolute fact that my most powerful attack would wipe your pathetic existence from the face of the earth." She eyed her bandaged left arm as she said this. "Even so, I doubt your attack will meet any success when met by mine."

"We shall see!" her adversary cried. As he did so, all the energy that he had gathered, his entire aura, began gathering at a fixed point a few inches in front of his chest.

"Tell me when you're ready," the demoness requested, extending her left hand in the direction of her opponent.

"Oh, you'll know when I'm ready!" he cried as his energy continued to gather at the previously mentioned point. As the energy converged, it formed a sphere of energy that took the appearance of a massive fire ball: there weren't flames erupting from it, but the energy sphere had a definitive magma-ish appearance.

"Ready?" the demoness asked tauntingly. This did not help her enemy's already foul mood. He growled to himself a bit while preparing, but soon, his attack was ready. It was obvious, because his energy sphere suddenly flashed before turning an even brighter red. "I'll take that as a yes. Now for the fun part." She took a deep breath, then the two of them cried, at the same time:

"Hellfire Flash!" "FLAMING INFERNO BEAM!"

The demoness's trademark attack was met half-way by a bright red beam of pure heat energy: the core of the blast had the magma appearance of the sphere it originated from, and small flares were coming off the beam at a few points. In the center, where the two blasts meet, the tips expand out in all directions, forced into this new shape by the force each beam exerts on the other. The image of two fully-opened umbrellas pointed at each other could describe it roughly.

"Well, well, well...you're better than I thought, kid," the demon declared, impressed, causing the human to smirk, despite the effort he was pouring into his Flaming Inferno Beam. "Your ultimate attack has potential. But I can tell that you can't fully control it." Even as she said so, his eyes began turning red all over: he was being possessed by some force outside of his own consciousness. "This attack is the physical manifestation of your inner rage, and I can see a lot of it there." He uttered an unholy scream and arched his back as if in pain as the Flaming Inferno Beam increased in power, but the demoness held it in check. "I can also tell that all of your power is being used up by this attack: win or lose, you'll have nothing left. Therefore, I find it prudent to put you out of your misery." Thus, ever calmly and ever slowly, she put a little more power behind her Hellfire Flash, pushing it closer and closer to her foe. Desperately, he threw both arms forward in an attempt to bolster his attack, but the onslaught continued at an agonizingly slow pace. Inch by inch, second by second, the superior attack made its way toward its target.

"No!" he cried. "This can't be happening!" As this was happening, the enraged human's eyes, previously glowing red, began to fade. It was obvious that he had stopped pouring any sort of magical or spiritual energy into his attack: he was beginning to put his _life_ into it. Even so, he was still losing momentum: the demoness was having to put less and less energy into her attack to push it towards him. Soon, there was only a few yards separating him and his demise.

Suddenly, the "rational" side regained control with a gasp similar to one who has been revived from a potential drowning situation. "Hunhunhun..." he laughed from his throat as he remembered what happened while his anger was in control and realized his situation. "Well, I guess we know who is superior, don't we...Sapphire?" The forementioned demoness raised an eyebrow as her foe finally named her. "Even in my own realm, I am inferior to you...how is it that you are so powerful, you blow away all competition...no matter where you are?"

"That's for me to know," she replied simply and smugly.

"Well...I suppose it will be time for me to meet my maker, soon," the ill-fated challenger mused with the Hellfire Flash/Inferno Beam inching ever closer. "I suppose...you think...that I'm not even...worthy...to..." Suddenly, before he could complete his statement, his arms fell to his sides as he collapsed backwards as the Hellfire Flash sped forward to envelop him.

In that moment, it was over. Somehow, the challenger had evaded complete vaporization, but it was all too obvious to the sole onlooker that he was dead: he was drained of most color, charred in many places, and completely immobile. In a curious act of respect towards her challenger, Sapphire retrieved his cloak and staff from the area under the trees where he had left them and placed them on top of his unmoving body. She drifted up several yards into the air above him and took one last look down at her challenger, complete with cloak and staff. Then she turned her back and flew away in search of a way back to her own dimension.

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There it is. It was a one-shot, so don't expect any more chapters on this. I hope you enjoyed it. 


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